This invention relates to hand-held condiment grinders that include multiple chambers and a grinding actuating mechanism that will selectively actuate a grinder mechanism for each chamber.
Hand-held condiment grinders are known. These grinders usually have a single chamber for holding only one condiment at a time, such as, peppercorns, salt, seeds or the like. One grinder of this type is shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,697,749 and 4,573,244. Some grinders have more than one chamber to hold more than one condiment at the same time but these multiple chamber grinders require more complicated, separately actuated grinding mechanisms, each fully separate from the other so that two different grinding mechanisms and actuating mechanisms for those grinding mechanisms are required.
This invention is a multiple chamber condiment grinder, preferably having two separate chambers, but in which a common grinding actuating mechanism is used by being selectively positioned over each chamber. In one embodiment, the grinding actuating mechanism is rotatably mounted to be rotated selectively over one or the other of the separate chambers. In another embodiment, a cam is moved to be selectively positioned over one or the other of the separate chambers. Other variations of the selective actuation of the grinding mechanism may also be employed.